Forget the curse of the Billy Goat or the curse of the Bambino. The real curse is the curse of Blake Whitney.
Yep, that's me. I'm bad luck. If you're a football coach and I'm rooting for your team, something horrible is going to happen.
My earliest NFL memory is the 1989 Super Bowl between the San Francisco 49ers and the Cincinnati Bengals -- the Bengals lost in the final moments. Little did we all know then that the greatest curse in sports history was born. I mean, we all know what the Bengals have done since then, right?
And thus, as I kicked and cried and screamed because the Bengals lost, the curse began.
My paranormal tendencies next dipped into the college game...and I grew up in Lexington, Ky., before going to school in Athens, Ohio. See where I'm headed?
Ohio and Kentucky have combined to win 169 of 483 games played since I've been alive. I've effectively killed six coaching careers, and I'm still working on Jim Grobe.
In my lifetime, Kentucky and Ohio have combined for 14 seasons with two or fewer wins. By comparison, they have combined for a whopping seven winning seasons. Quick math shows that under my curse, you're twice as likely to go 2-10 than 6-5.
Kentucky home losses to Northeast Louisiana and Ohio home losses to Northern Iowa and, gulp, Northeastern, also are the direct result of my work.
And yes, the curse can be so powerful that I don't even have to be at the game. As long as I'm connected to someone inside the stadium, my magic can still be worked.
Take last season for instance. I'm sitting back at Peden Stadium, watching
Chad Brinker run all over the Akron Zips, when my Dad calls me from Commonwealth Stadium, where he's watching Kentucky play LSU.
Me: Hello.
Other line: Blake
it's Dad.
Me: Oh hey OU's actually winning. How bad is the UK...
Dad: We're gonna beat LSU! We're gonna beat LSU! Up 30-26 with 12 seconds left. People are...
Me: No way!
Dad: Yes
I'm serious. There are 12 seconds left
and LSU has to go 85
